Austin Kleon Quotes

The only way to find your voice is to use it. It’s hardwired, built into you. Talk about the things you love. Your voice will follow.

It’s one of my theories that when people give you advice, they’re really just talking to themselves in the past.

Usually, when we talk about creativity, it's about self-expression, which is great, but for work to be art or design, there has to be someone on the other end. The audience makes the work come alive.

Don't wait until you know who you are to get started.

Be curious about the world in which you live. Look things up. Chase down every reference. Go deeper than anybody else--that's how you'll get ahead.

You can’t be content with mastery; you have to push yourself to become a student again.

You’re only going to be as good as the stuff you surround yourself with.

You can't find your voice if you don't use it.

Don't worry about doing research. Just search.

The thing is: It takes a lot of energy to be creative. You don't have that energy if you waste it on other stuff.

Today isn't just another day. Today I'll create something beautiful.

Write the book you want to read

Read deeply. Stay open. Continue to wonder.

You are, in fact, a mashup of what you choose to let into your life. You are the sum of your influences. The German writer Goethe said, "We are shaped and fashioned by what we love."

Every new idea is just a mashup or a remix of one or more previous ideas.

The more good ideas you collect, the more you can choose from to be influenced by.

The only way to find your voice is to use it

You are, in fact, a mashup of what you choose to let into your life.

The biggest task in the morning is to try to keep my headspace from being invaded by the outside world.

Be boring. (It’s the only way to get work done.)

There's a balance between what you want to give the world and what it needs. If you're lucky, your work is in the middle.

Travel makes the world look new, and when the world looks new, our brains work harder.

Collect books, even if you don't plan on reading them right away. Filmmaker John Waters has said, "Nothing is more important than an unread library."

If you’re worried about giving your secrets away, you can share your dots without connecting them.

The artist is a collector. Not a hoarder, mind you, there's a difference: Hoarders collect indiscriminately, artists collect selectively. They only collect things that they really love.

If you ever find you're the most talented person in the room, you need to find another room.

Be nice. (The world is a small town.)

The minute you learn something, turn around and teach it to others.

The best advice is not to write what you know, it's to write what you like.

Unless you are actually a ninja, a guru, or a rock star, don't ever use any of those terms in your bio. Ever.

Dig into almost every overnight success story and you’ll find about a decade’s worth of hard work and perseverance.

In order to be found, you have to be findable.

What a good artist understands is that nothing comes from nowhere. All creative work builds on what came before. Nothing is completely original.

Don't think of your website as a self-promotion machine, think of it as a self-invention machine.

The best way to get started on the path of sharing your work is to think about what you want to learn, and make a commitment to learning it in front of others.

Every artist gets asked the question, 'Where do you get your ideas?' The honest artist answers, 'I steal them.'

We found the future, like birds fly into windows.

In the end, creativity isn’t just the things we choose to put in, it’s the things we choose to leave out.

Establishing and keeping a routine can be even more important than having a lot of time.

Art that only comes from the head isn't any good. Watch any good musician and you'll see what I mean.

Creative people need time to just sit around and do nothing.

Show your work, and when the right people show up, pay close attention to them, because they'll have a lot to show you.

Pretend to be making something until you actually make something.

If we're free from the burden of trying to be completely original, we can stop trying to make something out of nothing, and we can embrace influence instead of running from it.

The people who get what they’re after are very often the ones who just stick around long enough.

You'll either find the answer or you'll come up with a better question.

It sounds a little extreme, but in this day and age, if your work isn't online, it doesn't exist.

Keep all your passions in your life.

Copying is about reverse-engineering.

School is one thing. Education is another. The two don’t always overlap. Whether you’re in school or not, it’s always your job to get yourself an education.